


Staying Away From The Edge

by starspawnedwarlock



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Sadstuck, and other stuff idk, john has fuckin DEPRESSION
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-12 22:18:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18455729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starspawnedwarlock/pseuds/starspawnedwarlock
Summary: Some sadstuck John in the wake of the Epilogue prologue, who gets comforted by a certain spider8itch





	Staying Away From The Edge

**Author's Note:**

> Partly inspired by "Sleeping and other shorthanded vices" (aka my favourite johnvris fic EVER, READ IT)  
> But mostly Inspired by TheaterHero on twitter who mentioned this idea in a tweet

John groaned as he sat up from his bed, staring forward at his blurry bedroom wall. He couldn't make out the font of the posters facing him, both from his lack of glasses, and the darkness that filled his room. Only the faint glow of fireflies from the village outside brought any substance of light to his room.

Rubbing his face roughly with his hands, wiping away the drool from the brief moments he had managed sleep, John sighed. He pondered his predicament as he reached out to the lamp by his bedside, fumbling for the switch somewhere along the lead. He had been lying in bed for near two hours now, and had only managed brief minutes of sleep, before being awoken by the constant dreams. Dreams of things he wish he could forget.

Finally finding the switch, he flicked it, and closed his eyes slightly as the rays shined across his face. Without looking, he searched across the beside table for his glasses and winced as his fingers slid across the broken surface of the ceramel lamp. Bringing his hand up to his face, he pressed his pained finger against his mouth. He had broken it a few weeks ago, but hadn't mustered the will to replace it.

Looking over with partly shut eyes, he reached out to the blurred outline of his glasses, and carefully placed them on his face. Finally able to see to a better degree, John looked around his room. Clothes littered the floor, as did crumb covered crockery and the occasional can, from the lesser days of late. He hadn't brought the vacuum to the room in some time, either. Didn't have much reason to. Not like anyone save for him saw the room anymore.

With a grunt he got up from the bed. it wasn't as easy as it used to be, for sure. It had only gotten harder and harder over the last few years, ever since the game finished. He could probably have taken greater care of his body.

Carefully stepping over clothes and random object lying on the ground, John made his way out to the hallway. The white walls weren't the most beautiful thing to him, and the frames on the wall never meant much to him anymore, apart from grief. He didn't know why he still kept the harlequin pictures up. They just reminded him of his dad, he guessed.

Kanaya had once insisted on remodelling the house for "His Own Good", although he had adamantly refused, for some reason. Stepping down the stairs, John heard naught but his own breathing and the faint hum of the fridge within the kitchen, where his tired mind was set.

The kitchen was as dark as the rest of the house, until he pulled open the fridge, and the cold light spilled out, filling the room with a wide beam, and casting his shadow across it. Reaching inside, he pulled out a carton of milk. John opened the carton, and tried to keep his mind on less taxing topics than previous, as he began to chug down the content. He didn't care to notice as milk dripped down over the sides of his lips.

After quenching his thirst, John placed the carton back inside, and closed the fridge door. He let his hand linger on the handle for a moment, as he stared straight ahead to the near unseeable picture pinned up on the surface by a magnet. He couldn't see it, but he could easily remember its every detail, even if there weren't many to remember. It was a picture of his dad.

Looking down, John walked out of the kitchen, avoiding a box he had left on the floor for some reason. He wondered if he would finally be able to resume sleep, as he walked back up the stairs to his room. Some nights he didn't get any sleep at all, and would simply let one day of doing nothing fade right into the next.

John sighed once again as he pushed open the door to his room. The greeting sight was just as underwhelming as when he left. He fell back down onto his bed, lifted his glasses form his face, placing them beside him, before laying back down to sleep, hoping that sleep would finally find him.

He was another twenty or so minutes into this when his phone buzzed beside him. Reaching over he grabbed his glasses. After placing them haphazardly on his face, he took the phone and read the single message on the screen, just under the time. 02:59.

AG: Ay Eg8ert you awake?

John felt a spark of hope for the night, and began to type back.

EB: yeah, i am.  
AG: Wanna hangout?  
EB: it's really late.  
AG: And you're really awake.  
EB: can't argue with that i suppose.  
AG: Sweet!  
AG: I'm outside your window.  
EB: wait what?

John raised an eyebrow, before hearing something clack against his window. He looked over at the pane of glass, through which he could only see the fireflies floating around in  
the distance.

_clack_

Surely she didn't actually...

_clack_

Grimacing, John pulled himself up once again. He began to step towards the window, and swore as he tripped over a pair of jeans strewn across the floor.

_clack_

Nursing his sore knee, the young man stumbled to the window, flicking the latch and grunting as he forced it open, hearing the wood creak as he did so. Poking his head out, he scanned the ground below for the offended.

_thud_

John yelped as a pebble struck him right in the forehead, causing him to fall back. He heard a less that quiet "Sh8t!" from the ground below. Rubbing the spot where the stone struck, John pulled himself to the window again, and slowly let his head pop out.

After a moment of searching, he his head out in the cold wind of the night, he could make out a figure standing down at the ground.

"Hey John." She whispered up to him, perhaps knowing it might upset him to disturb the consorts sleep.

"Hey Vriska.. why didn't you just fly up and knock?"

There was a moment of pregnant silence.

"Because... I didn't think of it."

That was fair.

"Soooo... can I come up?" She asked after John didn't respond.

"Oh, yeah." John stepped back as Vriska floated up, grabbing his windowsill and placing herself onto it. John collapsed back onto his bed, resting his arms on his legs.

"What are we going to do?"

"Well we could either mope around here in the dark or go, I dunno, shoot some hoops or something?"

John straightened up as he thought, taking a deep breath. It sounded like something interesting, he supposed. Although he would have to get changed for it. That wasn't something he was looking forward to, what with Vriska sitting in his window as she was. He glanced around the room floor for something that he could wear.

"Yeah that sounds good, just give me a moment."

John got up, and began to walk around the room, gathering a few pieces of clothing that he think would work for the cold. Vriska turned out, and watched the fireflies in the distance, mingling and swirling in the air.

He had spent many hours watching them when he first began his life here. After a year or so he had stopped.

Managing to get the clothes on decently, John let Vriska know she could turn around, which she did, slipping off the window and nearly falling to ground below. She hissed curses as she came back up, beckoning John out the window. John grabbed a basketball from his closet and walked over to the window.

It had been a while since he had flown, and he wasn't sure if he had it all nailed down as he used to. Stepping up to the sill, he steadied himself, then gently pushed himself up, feeling gravity lose its grip on him. Vriska gave him a thumbs up, and began to fly her way away, expecting him to follow.

Shaky at first, John soon managed to recover his skill at flying, and was zipping through hte air along with Vriska, who looked idly across the lands spread out below them. It took them twenty or so minutes before they finally reached the human kingdom, where Vriska liked to hang out. He wasn't sure why she avoided troll society so much, but she had only visited the troll kingdom a select number of times.

They eventually reached their destination, and settled down on the surface of the court. Vriska stretched as she walked her way towards the post. The courtyard was surrounded by a high chainlink fence, and lit by a number of streetlamps around them, giving the place an orange glow of sorts. They were a ways from any nearby houses, in the small suburbia where they were. It was a decent distance from the city, where Jane mostly spent her time. John hadn't spoken to her in what felt like years.

Vriska clapped her hands together, indicating for the ball. John passed it over, watching it bounce on the ground once, before finding her hands. Taking aim, Vriska settled her arms into position, before pushing them forward, and watching as the ball bounced off the rim.

"Oh fuck off!"

John smiled as the ball bounced towards him. He bounced it once or twice, before taking aim himself. After a precious second of sailing through the air, it slipped through the net.

"8ullshit!"

John chuckled as the ball bounced back. He passed it over to Vriska, who took aim again. This time the shot landed in, although messily.

She threw a glare in his direction.

John grinned as he lined up another shot, noticing Vriska watching him intently. He decided he might as well make her less likely to fling the ball at him, should she miss the next shot.

"So why are you up?" The ball landed near perfectly in the net.

Vriska bounced the ball a few times as she thought, perhaps remembering why, or maybe just wondering if she should tell him.

"Nightmares." She said finally, before taking another shot. It was better than the last, although still nothing great. "You?"

"The same, I think." He watched as the ball rolled towards him.

"You think?"

"There could be a lot of reasons I guess."

Vriska didn't respond as he took the shot, and it once again landed in, although not brilliantly. He seemed to have kept his decent experience with basketball from before the game, and the odd times he used to play with Dave and the others.

The tall light presiding over their game flickered, and John glanced up to see the small group of flies dancing in the air about it. He rubbed his slightly chilly hands together, seeing the backdrop of stars behind them, spanning the sky. He could see his own symbol up there. His little ghost, a constellation among all the others.

Breathing some warmth into his hand, he looked back to Vriska, who was watching with hopeful eyes at the ball as it sailed through the air. It missed, and she surely must have woken somebody with the string of curses that followed.

John smiled, reached his hand out to grab the ball.

"So what were yours a8out?" Vriska asked, as he held the ball in both his hands, feeling the countless bumps on his palm.

"Stuff that happened in the game."

"I dou8ted it would be anything different."

John brought his arms up to shoot.

"At first it was mostly Jack, and the stuff he did." The ball landed nicely in the net. "The stuff I saw on the top of that castle, and the fights I had with him."

Vriska caught the ball.

"At first I just thought he was a scary monster, and that was it, you know? Just some face value scary. But, I was wrong about that. I didn't expect what happened to... do all this?"

The Serket looked glum as he spoke, and quickly took another swing at getting a well placed hoop.

"What did it do?"

John stared ahead. "I can barely sleep much anymore, or else I see him, snarling, with his bloody sword. I'd see my dad... lying there." He stopped speaking, looking back to Vriska.

"What about you?"

"Mostly stuff from Alternia. The stuff I did to survive, and to be like that fucking pirate."

Vriska took up the ball again as it bounced towards her, small little hops along the ground, and threw it over to John.

"And all the stuff I did in the game. Fucking everything up for everybody. Making Jack." She looked down as John slowed the passing of the ball between his hands. She had told him long before that she had done it, and he had been rightfully angry at the time. Eventually he had come to forgive her, but it never really left her mind.

"I stay awake with the guilt sometimes, just staring at my ceiling. I had no real reason to do it, really. Just my own infatuation with wanting something to fight, to prove myself, not to myself but to her."

John landed another one in the net.

"I spent so long trying to be like her, mimic her every action, idolizing her, I never stopped to think how much I fucking hated her."

John had heard something like that before, shortly after the game ended, when dave had deigned to tell him about it. It had been a shock then, and he supposed he should have seen it back then, even when Dave couldn't.

"Maybe if i hadn't have found her stuff it would have worked out differently. Maybe. Or maybe it would have played out the same. Could just be me, I suppose. Might be pinning all of the blame on someone other than me. Wouldn't be the first time." She grimaced, and threw the ball once again.

It landed pretty well, possibly the best one yet. Her sad eyes lost the worst of the despair, and she batted the ball towards John, and stood between him and the post.

Bouncing the ball, the Egbert advanced, taking long steps forward, keeping his stance wide.

"You look like fucking Karkat!" Vriska yelled just as John went to go aorund her, causing him to snort and falter. Her hand shot out and grabbed the ball, and she stepped back, turning to take a shot.

John reached out and tried to stop her, but failed, as the ball soared in, and Vriska laughed victioriously, shoving John's shoulder.

The boy chuckled, retrieving the ball.

They went on like that for a while, into the early hours of the morning, shotting hoops, and speaking of what had happened to both of them. It wasn't pleasant, and more than once one of them had to wipe a tear from their cheek, as the drop of pain slithered down.

Vriska just managed to get a perfect hoop when John noticed the sun creeping up over the horizon. He could see some people beginning to leave their houses, getting on with their lives. It was a stark reminder of reality, but not an entirely unwelcome one.

Turning to the celebrating Vriska, he coudln't help but smile. Even if the night had been filled with hurt and anguish, they had come out of it smiling. Which was similar to a lot of things, really, but John didn't feel like getting too analysist this early in the morning.

Both of them frowned at the prospect of flying back to their houses, so Vriska offered to pay for a bus.

So they sat together as the bus trundled off, as their eyelids grew heavier and heavier. The tiredness in his head drowned out the voices of the other morning passengers, or the soft music coming from their headphones.

Eventually John awoke, his head having fallen onto Vriska's shoulder, who's head was tilted back, her mouth wide open in a snore fit to wake the dead. John snickered, sitting upright, much to the dismay of his neck. He probably had a bit to go before they reached his stop, at the edge of the human kingdom, but he was fine with it.

He was enjoying where he was at the the present moment. It wasn't something he felt often. Might as well make it last.

**Author's Note:**

> HA THIS SADSTUCK HAD A NOT EXTREMELY SADSTUCK ENDING TAKE THAT BET YOU FEEL BETTER NOW HUH


End file.
